


Use Me

by crackleviolet



Category: Mystic Messenger (Video Game)
Genre: F/M, Mint Eye AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-01
Updated: 2017-10-01
Packaged: 2019-01-07 16:07:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12236184
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crackleviolet/pseuds/crackleviolet
Summary: MC is a Mint Eye acolyte seducing Jumin Han for information. As she searches for data to hand over to the Saviour, she ends up with far more questions than answers.Written for Day 3 of JuminMC week 2017 (forbidden love/Secrets)





	Use Me

It seemed almost simple to say it had been a long few days.

MC’s body ached, her feet were covered in blisters and, even though she had spent the time wandering an empty apartment, she was sure she had bruises. The other acolytes watched in silence as she peeled off her civilian clothing, ready for the hot bath they had prepared for her.

“Oils, my lady?” Asked the first one, without comment of the perfume scent that lingered about her body.

“Please,” she said, but as one of them stepped forward to douse her naked form, lifted a hand. “I would like to be alone.”

The acolytes bowed their heads, muttered a few sentiments of obedience and left her alone to rinse her hair clean and sink down into the water until it cradled her body like a lover’s embrace. She would not be permitted to see the Saviour until she was cleansed of the contamination of the outside world and her heart fluttered at the prospect of finally being home; back in the castle where she might be able to report the things she had seen.

“Please,” she had cried only a few days earlier, face inches from the floor. “Use me.”

She had not expected the saviour to even consider her. There were so many better, more talented women in the castle and at least thirty more beautiful than she. The plot at hand was delicate and she was not sure if she had a soft enough touch, but staying in the castle to consider her uselessness seemed far worse than failure.

MC had never been a patient sort. Never content with her starchy robes; never content with the Saviour’s teachings; never content for a simple job. She was recruited at a subway station en route to work and dismissed the pamphlet at first, going so far as to spend the morning scoffing at the notion that a stranger she met in such a fashion might actually hold the key to paradise. After her days became increasingly mundane, however, she found herself curious at what exactly it was she was missing out on.

She sank into the water and watched as her skin turned from pink to red in the heat; searing away any traces of corruption as an open flame might. She cupped some of it in her hands and splashed it on her face, running her fingers through her hair and closing her eyes, only to snap them back up again when her fingertips hit cold metal.

In her haste to drag off her clothes, she had forgotten to remove the hairpin from her bun. She dragged it out there and then, meaning to call back the acolytes to dispose of it accordingly, only to turn it over and over in her fingers.

It was more expensive than anything she had ever owned, even before her arrival at Mint Eye, with bright red stones in the shape of a flower. The first time she saw it, it reminded her of firelight; of the Saviour getting to her feet and stepping down from her throne, all while MC’s hands trembled on the floor.

“I’m sorry,” she had sobbed, “I just…I want to be useful. I want to serve.”

She expected to be admonished, only to be shown to a private antechamber, hands still trembling and remembering firelight all the while.

“You’ll need these,” the Saviour had said, showing her to a set of neatly folded clothes. Civilian clothes that likely belonged to a different acolyte and were expressly forbidden in the castle.

“Forgive me,” MC had gasped, falling to her knees once more. “I did not mean to offend you, I-”

She was convinced the Saviour meant to expel her back to the mundane life she had lived before; back to a life of office cubicles and cup noodles. The Saviour only laughed, though, and took her by the shoulder.

“I thought you wanted this assignment. Have you changed your mind already?”

MC had been so utterly desperate to be chosen, but the moment it was within her grasp she found herself hesitating. She knew only the bare bones of the plan; only that it was important. She had convinced herself that staying behind would be more unbearable than failing, but suddenly she wondered if that was true.

She ultimately said nothing of her concerns, however, and instead sat down to listen to the Saviour’s full plot. She nodded and mumbled words of compliance to everything expected of her without stopping to question the consequences if somehow she managed to compromise everything.

“Here is the man I want you to investigate,” the Saviour told her, handing over a file with a man’s photograph inside. “He has intelligence in his penthouse that rightfully belongs to our cause.”

MC did not ask how such a thing came to be, instead staring into the man’s photo, hating him for taking something that did not belong to him.

It was the first time MC had entered the city in several months and it felt very much as if she was seeing it for the first time. She had once considered it overwhelming, but this time around she only felt pity. These people had yet to understand the meaning to their mundane lives; any happiness they felt could only ever be artificial until they discovered the true paradise.

As she sank into the bathwater, she considered that she had pitied the RFA too, though knew better than to say so. When she loaded up the strange messenger and told them the story the Saviour had given her, she took in their every turn of phrase and concern. They were ignorant of the truth and suffering from the trivialities of an artificial world and it took everything she had not to tell them that one day she would save them.

In the end it was a mixed blessing that her assignment was to focus on the one named Jumin Han. His world was the most artificial of all and while he stood apart from the others as a consequence, it was far more difficult to step back into character and avoid telling him the unadulterated truth. He lived in grandeur and suffered accordingly with an empty life and MC wanted nothing more than to reassure him that there was hope every time they sat alone on the messenger. She knew such a thing was impossible, though, for if ever she came to speak of the paradise, she would not be able to speak to him anymore.

She had expected to hate him but, in truth, she would be lying if she said she did not enjoy their conversations. He was not a patient sort either and she recognised many of her own struggles within him. Sometimes she caught herself poring over his photographs, lamenting what a shame it was that his salvation was so close at hand and he simply did not know it. When he spoke on the phone of his father and extravagant meals, she considered how beautiful he would be when free of the corruption and lies of the outside world. He was lost, alone and when he spoke of tangled strings inside of him she thought she understood. It was only after the Saviour took her hand to set her free that she ever truly felt loved or acknowledged by anyone.

As she reached for the plug to drain away the water, she recalled the moment she stepped into his apartment, eying each and every bookshelf, every safe and every drawer.

“Would you like me to show you around?”

 _Oh_. He trusted her.

It hurt but she didn’t know why.

Every evening that that he was home, she sipped at the wine that he gave her and delighted in each and every philosophical conversation topic. She sat in awe at each violin concerto and clapped her hands to her mouth at the dresses he brought home for her. During the day she rifled through his every cupboard and memorised every snippet of data, all while complaining down the phone that she missed him.

“Come home soon,” she whined once. “I want to kiss you.”

He fell silent at that and her heart skipped a beat. She wondered if she had gone too far.

That day, though, he came home via helicopter.

MC set aside her hairpin as she reached for a towel and climbed out of the bath. It glimmered in the corner of her eye as she wrapped the towel around her body and she turned away, focusing instead on the water disappearing down the drain.

She had recently emerged from a bath then, too. Jumin usually arrived home late and she had spent the best part of twenty minutes picking the lock of a safe in the master bedroom. She greeted him every evening when he returned from work, always putting on a show of dropping whatever she was doing to wrap her arms around his middle. As such, he did not notice her genuine expression of surprise as she came running to greet him, her tools long since cast aside and hidden.

“I brought you something,” he said, leaning into her embrace. “It’s not much, but I saw it and thought of you.”

Two days earlier, he had asked for her favourite colour, smirking into his glass as he confessed exactly how much he wanted to know her.

“You are a constant source of fascination to me. There is…so much I want to know.”

MC preferred the hue of Burgundy wines, dark lipstick and pomegranates. She remembered her vows to the saviour, though, as she set down her drink and instead of wine and lipsticks, channeled rainforests and arctic skies.

As a consequence, she did not know what to do with the hairpin as he passed it to her.

“I know that your favourite colour is green,” Jumin said, mistaking her shocked silence for one of disappointment, “but this shade of red would suit you far better.”

As if to demonstrate the point, he lifted a lock of her hair-still damp from the bathwater- and slipped the pin into place.

MC was sure she would never forget that moment: the warmth of his fingers brushing against the tip of her ear; expression of concentration replaced by something softer and far more dangerous.

Up until that point, she had relished every opportunity to speak to him. However fascinated he was by her, she returned in kind without him knowing. He was no acolyte, whose individual opinions never quite reached the surface, nor an ordinary civilian who lacked an outsider’s perspective. It was never difficult to speak to him of philosophy, ethics and more, but on this occasion she found her mind falling blank. Ultimately, she settled for saying nothing at all; standing up onto her tiptoes and kissing him on the cheek.

He wanted something she could not give; something that no longer belonged to her. Her body, though, that was another thing entirely. As they stumbled onto the bed, Jumin throwing aside his jacket and dragging at his tie as he sighed into her kisses, MC wanted nothing more than to fall to her knees and beg him as she had the Saviour.

 _Please_ , she screamed on the inside as he untied her bathrobe, _use me_.

She gasped as he trailed soft kisses along her neck and jawline; gripping her hand tight against the pillow and reaching down to part her legs with the other. She closed her eyes to the feel of his fingertips against her thighs, squeezing the hand that gripped hers.

_Use me like I’ve used you._

He hesitated, though. She opened her eyes to see if there was a problem, taking note of the blush peppering his cheeks.

_Ah. Perhaps it really was his first time._

She sat up and guided him down onto the pillows, straddling his waist as she reached down to unbutton his shirt. He stopped her, though, instead taking her hand in his and kissing every knuckle.

“I love you,” he whispered, linking his fingers with hers.

It should not have come as a surprise to her. She had played her part perfectly, after all. She had laughed and smiled at his jokes, brushed pancake batter from his cheeks, asked him to read to her and rested her head on his lap to listen. In retrospect, she had seen it coming, but she found she could do nothing more than stare.

In the end, she was still impatient. Never content with a simple job; never content with her starchy robes; never content with the Saviour’s teachings; no longer content to be used.

No longer content with Paradise.

He took her silence for rejection and sat up, expression suddenly serious even if his eyes were still gentle.

“I’m sorry,” he said, “I shouldn’t-”

She rested her hands on his chest, though, lowering her gaze to the bed sheets.

“Use me,” she whispered, eyes blurring with tears. “Please.”

He stayed silent and she tightened her grip on his shirt.

“Please,” she said, “I…”

She screwed her eyes shut, willing her tears to dry before she allowed herself to be vulnerable. That wasn’t part of the plan; she was supposed to be the one holding all of the cards.

Instead of speaking, though, Jumin leaned over and kissed her on the forehead.

“I could never cast aside someone as precious as you.”

She wanted to tell him that she was not precious; that she had carefully committed to memory all of the data in his apartment. She wanted to tell him it had all been a trick, but she no longer believed that herself.

She buried her face in his chest, shaking with sobs and hating herself with a newfound fervor every time he stroked her hair.

She left his apartment that very same night, and so there she was, freshly bathed and smelling of flowers. She did not know why she had kept the hairpin, but it lingered in her line of sight no matter how hard she tried to ignore it. Every time she saw the glimmering stones, she remembered the feel of his hands on her body; almost sad that she had washed it away in the bathwater.

With a sigh, she snatched it up, considering how best to dispose of it. She could not keep it, that much was certain. Acolytes gave up most possessions at their joining ceremony and the slightest hint of sentimentality to the outside world was almost always interpreted as treason. MC knew the obvious thing to do was to pass the hairpin onto her retainers for instantaneous disposal or to be placed with the Saviour for safekeeping. She could not do it, though. The more obvious the choice, the harder it was to decide.

Instead she wrapped it in a handkerchief, the perfect disguise for the innermost pockets of her robes. It would be her secret as she passed through the castle; a single blooming red rose in a field of brilliant green.

In the throne room later on, she considered the irony that she had once been so desperate to prove herself a true servant of the paradise that she had fallen to her knees and all but kissed the tiles. This time around, she stood up straight and handed over Jumin Han’s private data with a confident smile, thinking all the while of the hairpin in her pocket.

It would take about a week to process the data and run the numbers; to cross reference every name she so carefully spelled out.

By the time anyone realised she was lying, she would already be long gone.


End file.
